


I’ll always remember (to never forget you)

by nightlarry



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Fluff and Angst, Getting Back Together, Kid Fic, M/M, Twins
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-02-02
Updated: 2016-02-02
Packaged: 2018-05-17 19:10:57
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,894
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5882242
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nightlarry/pseuds/nightlarry
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Harry and Louis were in love once. Somewhere among bills to pay, jobs to work, hasty decisions and children to take care of, they forgot.</p><p>Featuring twin girls with a knack for trouble, a summer camp somewhere in New York, divorced parents, and a master plan to bring them together. </p><p>or, the Parent Trap AU no one really asked for.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I’ll always remember (to never forget you)

**Author's Note:**

> Hello!
> 
> Some quick notes: 
> 
> 1) I've taken the liberty to set up a summer camp in New York even though I don't know if anything similar actually exists. Oops. 
> 
> 2) Olivia's name does not come from the song of the same title. That was merely a coincidence.
> 
> 3) This will be split into 3 parts: before, during, after camp. Each part should be longer than the last, and the first one will be particularly short because it's more of a prologue than a real chapter.

“It was fate, Lou,” Harry had said once, when they were lying in Louis’ bed before finals week, drinking cheap beer and ignoring the real world and the immense amount of books Harry had to read through and the three designs Louis had to finish for the student showcase. Louis had smiled and kissed him, but Harry hadn't been done talking and he’d slapped him lightly in the arm and pouted. “It was fate we met. There's no way some higher power wasn't involved.”

Louis was a little reluctant about the whole “fate” ordeal, but he was willing to accept it for Harry's sake. In his eyes, “fate” didn't have as much to do as their need to get some good grades did. They'd met in an elective photography course in Uni, among lost-looking freshmen and seniors who didn't give much of a shit about the class. They had bonded over their pathetic lack of knowledge of cameras, when Harry had laughed as Louis tried to work the focus of the huge lens, and apologized when Louis had glared and explained he had the same problem and he just thought it was hilarious they'd signed up for the course when they were clearly oblivious about anything camera-related.

“I’m Harry. I’m majoring in business so I genuinely have no idea about anything related to photography,” he had introduced himself afterwards, a pretty dimple on his cheek. In retrospect, Louis was doomed the second the stupid dimple made an appearance, really. 

“Louis. Fashion major,” he’d said, taking Harry’s pre-offered hand in his and shaking it. Harry was wearing a bunch of rings and an array of bracelets. Louis liked him instantly. Not many boys he met liked to accessorize, and as a fashion major, he could appreciate when someone did. “I don’t know anything about photography, either.”

“At least you know a thing or two about art and pretty-looking things. That’s important for photography, innit?” Harry had asked, Louis had nodded, and they’d had a small chat of how this class was well on its way to become a nightmare for the both of them before class actually started and they were taught how to properly operate the camera the school was lending them for the semester, a horrible monstrosity at least a few years old with giant lenses that probably weighed more than a child. 

It hadn't been an easy grade, and as predicted on that first class, it had been a nightmare. It turns out, photography is a bit more complicated than choosing a pretty scene and snapping the shutter. Lights and angles and lenses and editing and other things are involved, and neither of them had had any idea that it'd be so complicated. They'd had a good time, though. They helped each other out during class, they went out together to take the photographs for their assignments, and they talked endlessly and shared stories and laughed at each other. Harry had a tendency to photograph the most irrelevant things (“No, Louis, I’m serious! Fruit represent happiness! I read that somewhere!” “This is just lazy photography, Curly.” “It’s art. Art representing happiness.”) and Louis enjoyed photographing landscapes, because they were immobile (mostly, of course; there was a particularly nasty encounter with some pigeons once) and pretty and it was a good excuse to leave campus and go on trips to different parts of London. It was fun, especially when Harry tagged along and they’d photograph things together. 

When the course had ended, they didn't stop seeing each other. They gave back their professional cameras to the school, but Louis remembers Harry’s personal, less-sophisticated instant camera that always printed the photographs a touch darker and a little bit blurry. Harry carried it around in his messenger bag, among his books and his single pen, and it was always at the ready, always snapping pictures of their little adventures—the first milkshake they shared (a monstrosity with too much whipped cream and only one cherry that had led to an argument over who would get to eat it) (Harry got it), Louis’ face when they'd gone on the London Eye for the first time (an awful picture in Louis’ opinion, but Harry has claimed it was a masterpiece, with the way Louis’ eyes were wide and bright), Louis proudly holding the exam he had aced when he thought he'd fail, every single moment of Louis’ first student showcase, of every design he’d put on the catwalk, selfies of Harry modeling this one hat Louis had designed once. 

Louis remembers Harry and his cork board, the one he’d hung on his dorm and filled with the polaroids through his years in Uni, the tickets to the London Eye, the ripped up tickets to the first movie they’d watched together, and other important bits and pieces of his time in school. Louis found it adorable and loved looking through it, loved pinning and unpinning things, loved adding his little notes to it. 

They'd fallen in love quickly. Harry is sure they’d fallen in love the second they’d laid eyes on each other during that first photography class, despite Louis’ claims that, “no, I’m very sure the moment I fell in love with you was when you tripped over your own feet while trying to photograph a squirrel.” It had taken a bit longer to admit it, though, despite all the kissing and the dates. 

It had been three semesters after the photography course, in winter, while they cuddled in Harry’s dorm (in one of the rare occasions when his roommate wasn't around), watching some Christmas movie and drinking hot chocolate, when Louis had blurted it out. Out of nowhere. Just straight up “I love you” without any context whatsoever. He had panicked for exactly eight seconds before Harry had beamed and said it right back. 

Things had gone a bit quicker after that. Louis went to Paris on a scholarship, an opportunity too good to waste, but they managed to make it work long-distance. The phone bills were very impressive, though. Harry doesn’t think he’d ever seen a list of calls as long. There were letters too, boring white envelopes holding long hand-written letters in Harry’s messy scrawls, with little drawings in the middle of sentence and several Polaroids always attached. Louis was particularly fond of those, and he kept them all in a little box under his shitty dorm bed. 

And then, in the blink of an eye, Louis was graduating and working for a small shop in London, and they rented a flat, finally. Harry kept going to school, and it worked perfectly because Harry would work on his assignments and on a small company where he’d landed a paid internship, and Louis would sketch the days away, cut and stitch fabric together, and it just  _ worked _ . Two years later, Harry was graduating too, and working for a big important company and everything was perfect. 

Harry had proposed in the middle of summer, among butterflies and flowers and with London agreeing enough to be sunny that day. Louis had accepted, of course, would’ve probably accepted to go to the end of the world with Harry, and they'd organised a wedding in record time (their mothers and sisters had gone positively feral with all of the quick organising) and sworn to love each other for eternity in front of everyone who mattered before autumn started, and they were just—they were the happiest couple. 

They got a surrogate two months later. They wanted a little boy, but when news had come that the surrogate had gotten pregnant with twins, Harry and Louis only had one minor freak out about economic implications, then Harry decided to pick double shifts, and Louis started reaching more stores with his designs and things were fine again. It worked. When they got news they'd be having twin girls, there was another minor freak out because how do you even raise  _ girls _ ? But they bought some baby books and read until their eyes hurt, and asked their mothers and sisters and then it'd been alright. 

Time had gone by quickly, too quickly, and suddenly it wasn't just Harry and Louis any more. It was Harry and Louis and Olivia and Emma Tomlinson-Styles. The twins were amazing in every way—two little bundles of joy with light brown hairs on their heads and bright green eyes and some serious pair of lungs on them. They liked to work those simultaneously, and usually in the middle of the night, and Harry and Louis would take turns to go and sing them to sleep again.

Realistically, they had been aware of how complicated things would be. They were young (Louis had barely just turned twenty four), practically straight out of Uni, and they didn't have the most stable jobs back then, but they thought they could make it work. Juggle unstable jobs, and tight budgets and two little babies who ate more than any baby should and had a penchant for pooping and crying at the same time.

They couldn't. 

Harry’s double shifts during the pregnancy carried on through the twin’s first years. They became more frequent when Louis had to cut work time to feed two babies at the same time with only one pair of hands (it was a Herculean task to keep one baby from crying for the entire building to hear and feed the other one at the same time), change diapers that made him gag, and complain to Harry about his need for his extra pair of hands. Louis got angrier and angrier and Harry went on longer and longer shifts, and the twins kept crying, and he loved his sisters and his mum, he really did, but if he had to deal with any of them shooting him pitying looks when it was apparent that his life had taken an unexpected, wild turn, he was going to  _ scream _ . 

That’s how the arguments started. It was row after row with different variations of “you’re never home!” and “i’m trying to keep food in our mouths!” and “do you not love your daughters at all?” and “fucking hell, Louis, you  _ know _ I love my daughters more than anything in this world!” and “then  _ act _ like it!” and slamming of doors. It steadily escalated until it wasn’t even arguments about Harry’s barely-there presence at home and Louis’ ever-growing stress. There were arguments about slightly burnt toast. About Louis’ socks on the floor. One particularly nasty one about a broken lightbulb Harry had promised to fix but never did. 

It was on the girls’ first birthday when they finally snapped. It was something silly, and Louis couldn't tell you what it was if you asked him, but they had both exploded and there had been screaming from them, and the girls had cried, and the birthday cake in the oven had burnt, and Harry had packed his bags and left for his mum’s, and the birthday party had consisted of both of their mums looking awkward and concerned while Harry was off in Anne’s house and everyone pretended like the tension in the room wasn’t suffocating them all.

Harry had been back the next morning, and he'd apologized to Louis and the girls even though they couldn't understand him, but things never went back to normal after that, whatever their normal was now. They'd tried to brush it off, tried to make it work and ignore that Louis wasn't smiling as much, that Harry was still spending long periods of time in the office, but then it became too much again, and they started fighting again, and the arguments started getting a bit old as the months went by, so they did the only reasonable thing that would spare them the headaches. 

They got a divorce. 

That's where things got a bit trickier, because they had the girls to think of. They spent weeks in court, weeks with lawyers and more fighting, until they had settled on keeping a girl each. Of course neither of them wanted that, because it was just cruel to separate the twins, who always giggled at each other and had taken their first steps together and now never went anywhere separately, but there was no other way to come to an agreement. So Olivia had stayed with Harry and Emma had stayed with Louis, agreements had been signed, last names had been changed, and that was that.

They never saw each other again. Harry packed his bags and Olivia’s and was out of the flat faster than one would've thought possible. Louis had cried that night, had cried that night and the following three, because he loved Harry, dammit, he loved Harry and things had gotten so bad but he had loved him  _ so  _ much, but then it got easier. This was for the best, after all. He couldn't live with someone he would just be arguing with all the time, and his daughters didn't deserve that either. This was for the best. 

Fate, apparently, had some different plans from what Harry had originally thought back in Uni. Fate was a bit cruel, in Louis’ opinion, and photography courses should be banned from schools.

 

**OoOoOo**

 

**_10 years later_ **

 

**OoOoOo**

  
  


**_New York_ **

 

“Listen, dad, I'll be fine,” Emma says for what could easily be the thousandth time. Louis isn't counting though, no, but he has a feeling. If he’s stubborn, Emma is a thousand times more. “I’ll be very fine. More than fine. I'll be amazing.” 

Louis is still a little uneasy. “I'm your father. Let me worry.”

“No.” Emma deadpans, then attempts to pull her hand out of Louis’. “Let me go! I'll be fine! You're not backing out now, are you? I didn't come all the way to America for nothing.”

Louis rolls his eyes. “You came all the way to America because I have work to do here, Em. Don't be dramatic.”

“You said you'd let me go!” The girl whines, curls bouncing with the movement of her heels lifting off the ground and back down. “We’re already here, dad! Look at all the kids! Look at all the parents  _ not  _ worrying! I'll be fine!”

Sadly, Emma is right. She is  _ eleven  _ and she is right. She'll be a menace when she gets older. Louis is ecstatic for the incredible teenage years to come. Except not really. He is terrified out of his wits. But yes, Emma is right. Parents are dropping off their kids calmly, passing on their luggage and kissing them on the forehead and waving them off. He figures these kids probably live in the continent though, so that's probably why they are slightly more comfortable. 

He already signed Emma up, though. He did that weeks ago, actually, online. He passed through a security desk earlier, and a lady smiling way too bright for someone’s who’s about to spend three weeks in the woods with hundreds of children, and confirmed Emma’s assistance. She’s technically already in. He’s paid for this. It would be stupid to back out when Emma is literally  _ in the camp _ now. 

Louis is just queasy. But Emma had been begging to come to this camp for weeks, and Louis is nothing if not a father who spoils his daughter rotten. And also, the dates had coincidentally, magically aligned perfectly with Louis’ scheduled trip to New York. Emma had been way too excited when she’d found this out, and there had been no way for him to get out of it. 

Surely he can go three weeks without Emma. He'll be fine. She'll be fine. It will all be fine. He doesn't need to panic. 

Sure, he's leaving his baby for the first time in his life—for three whole weeks and in a different  _ continent,  _ for Christ’s sake _ —,  _ but Emma needs to grow up. Do new things. Meet new people. It's a  _ healthy _ thing to do, right? Liam had agreed with his reasoning. His mum too. Everyone had agreed. It was an informed decision. 

And Louis had done his research, and it's a perfectly safe camp with people perfectly capable of handling anything that may happen. He's paying enough to ensure that, too. Emma will be fine. He needs to get it together. 

He kneels down to her level, and Emma's eyes light up, clearly aware that she's got Louis now. “Listen Pumpkin, I might have to go back home before your three weeks are due, depending on Bridezilla,” he says, Emma giggling at their little joke (a bride with too much money who has gone through eight different dresses Louis has had the misfortune of designing) “so I might have to send uncle Liam to pick you up, yes?” Emma nods eagerly, green eyes bright with excitement and curls bouncing all over the place. “Don't leave with anyone else, under any circumstance, okay?”

“I  _ know _ , dad.” Emma says, dragging the words a little. “Can I go now?”

Louis grabs her around her arms and pulls her in for a kiss on her forehead. “Be good, yes? Don't cause too much trouble. Eat your veggies. Be nice to people. Don't fight anyone, _please.”_ Emma giggles again. Louis knows already at least two rules will be broken. “I'll miss you like crazy.”

“I’ll miss you too, dad.” Emma tells him, and this time it's her who places the kiss to his forehead. “You don't stay up too late. And don't yell at people too much.” 

Louis’ heart swells up. He loves his daughter so much he can't contain it sometimes. His face breaks into a grin, and he pulls her in for a tight hug. Emma hugs back only for a moment, but then pulls back mumbling something about people seeing and “I'm almost twelve dad, jeez,” and Louis chuckles a little. 

“Behave, yes? I'll see you in three weeks.” 

Emma squeals, jumps a little, hugs him tight around the neck, then collects her big blue bag and runs off. Louis watches her reach a lady in a camp uniform, and he watches as she excitedly talks to the woman and the woman replies back just as happily. She hands Emma some papers, and the girl smiles wide and beams. 

Louis feels a bit teary eyed, but he won't cry. Absolutely not. That'd be just plain embarrassing. Emma turns around, locks eyes with Louis, stands on her tippy-toes as if to make herself taller, and waves, big smile plastered on her face. Louis waves back, and when Emma is satisfied, she turns back around and runs, and Louis loses her in the crowd. He's a bit paranoid for a moment, but then takes a deep breath and forces himself to turn around. 

His driver for however long this trip will take is waiting in the car, and Louis collapses heavily onto the leather seat with a sigh. 

“First time away from her?” The man asks him as he turns on the engine. 

“Yeah.” Louis mumbles, unable to watch out the window because he  _ kno _ ws he’ll break into a cry. That'd be just pathetic. 

“She’ll be alright. And she'll have fun.” The man says, and Louis nods and tries to focus on anything else to distract himself.

 

**OoOoOo**

 

**_California_ **

“Yes, I packed my toothbrush,” Olivia says, and Harry can practically feel the eye roll, even though he can't see her. “And before you ask, yes, I have my inhaler with me. I have two, actually. I'll be fine.”

“You'll call me if anything happens, right, love?” Harry insists for the millionth time. 

“I won't have a phone with me,” Olivia says warily, like Harry should know this. He does. He forgets things sometimes, is all. He's a bit distracted. “But I'll have the camp call if anything happens. I promise.”

“I already miss you.” Harry says, and Olivia laughs a little. 

“I’ve been gone for like, six hours, dad.”

“Yeah, Harry. Six hours.” Niall says from the background, barely understandable with all the noise and chattering the background. Harry presses the volume buttons on the side of his cell phone, even though he knows the volume is as high as it can go. 

“Uncle Niall is making faces at you,” Olivia tells him, and Harry can't even be angry. 

“Tell your Uncle to stop being rude and to check you in.” 

“I can do that myself.” Olivia protests immediately. “In fact, I'll be going now. Bye dad! I'll miss you! See you in three weeks!” 

And that's that. It's not nearly enough of a proper goodbye, but they'd already had one in the morning, when he'd dropped Niall and her at the airport, so he doesn't feel too bad. He's given her a proper dad talk (a twenty minute speech that could be summed up in “be nice to people, make lots of friends, and have fun”). 

He hears shuffling of the phone, and Niall shouting something that oddly sounds like “you little monster, phones are breakable!” and Harry only bites back a smile.

“Hey, H, I'm gonna go now. She's just ran off and—”

“Niall!” 

“I still have my eyes on her, don't get your knickers in a twist. I'll hang up though. Gotta run.”

Harry doesn't even get to say goodbye. The dial tone cuts off any reply he has, and Harry sets the phone down and stares wearily at the papers strewn in front of him. Balance sheets and contracts are lining up every surface of the mahogany desk, and the fleeting visual of himself throwing everything into the fireplace on the library in the first floor fills his head, but he's quick to push the thought out. 

His phone beeps with a message, and he picks it up and unlocks it to find a picture of Niall and Olivia—a selfie, really—, one of the Irishman’s arms wrapped around her neck and Olivia's hair flying everywhere, half covering her laughing face. The caption reads ‘caught her!’ and Harry is so incredibly fond his face might split with how big he's smiling. 

He regrets not being there, but some things take precedence to a children’s summer camp, and Niall is more than capable of delivering his child to said camp. Harry trusts the guy with his life, really. The plan, originally, had been for Harry to make the trip, but a meeting had appeared in his calendar out of nowhere—he’d given Sophia an earful about it, because Harry had made it clear he wanted his schedule empty for the day, but by the time he'd spotted the meeting, it had been too late—and Harry had to change the names of the plane tickets to Niall’s. He'd barely had time to see them off at the airport before he'd been whisked away to his meeting. 

Niall had sworn he didn't mind the impromptu trip to New York though, and even called up some friends and organized a night out before his trip back the next day. So it had all worked out, really. 

 

_ Harry Styles: _

_ Tell her I say to have a great time!!!!! _

_ Niall Horan:  _

_ She says she will ! Won't miss you one bit ! :) _

 

Harry stares at his phone for a moment, a smile lingering on his face, before Sophia knocks on his door and he has to come back to the real world where Sophia dumps another folder filled with documents on his desk. 


End file.
